Banksy Valentine’s Day mural highlights violence against women, but local UK council not happy
- The piece depicts a housewife with a swollen eye and missing teeth shoving a man into a real freezer – which the council ordered removed on ‘grounds of safety’
- Some locals protested, saying the appliance is part of the artwork. Officials say it will be returned once it has been ‘made safe to the public’
British street artist Banksy marked Valentine’s Day Tuesday with an inimitable statement about violence against women – but local politicians saw only a nuisance.
A Banksy mural appeared in Margate in southeast England, depicting a 1950s-style housewife with a swollen eye and a missing tooth seemingly shoving her male partner into a real chest freezer.
“Certainly we will be looking at how we can protect this and preserve it because we’re really proud to have it here,” Margate mayor Heather Keen said.
But minutes later, council workers turned up to throw the freezer into a van, despite protests from locals taking pictures of the mural, at the end of a terrace of houses in a rundown part of the seaside town.
Thanet District Council, which administers Margate, said the freezer was removed “on the grounds of safety as it was on public land”.
